Itzhak Perlman wields his fiddles in a fight against polio; performs in fundraising concert

Itzhak Perlman fiddles against polio

NEW YORK — Itzhak (ITS’-khahk) Perlman is playing the violin to help eradicate polio from the planet.

The 64-year-old violinist is performing Wednesday night with the New York Philharmonic in a special concert at Lincoln Center. The sponsors hope to raise money to fight the disease, which can cause paralysis or death.

Perlman was afflicted with polio when he was a 4-year-old boy in Israel. That was a decade before the development of vaccines that eventually limited the number of cases to about 2,000, according to World Health Organization figures.

Perlman says it’s time “to finish the job. … There’s just no excuse.”